Bai Tang

Biodata

Feature	Value
Name	Bai Tang (白棠)
Alias(es)	Senior Bai; Senior White 48 345
Species/Race	Initially believed to be a sword spirit; later revealed as one aspect of Qing He, a remnant of True Lord Qing Tang’s golden nature 345 346 347 348
Gender	Female 54
Affiliation	Jiang Yang’s companion; connected through Qing Tang to Azure Corner Heaven 346 347
Occupation/Role	Swordsmanship instructor, combat mentor, protector, and adviser to Jiang Yang 48 56 67 191
Status	Preparing to reincarnate through the River of Forgetfulness; the supplied passage does not show the reincarnation completed 391
First Appearance	Introduces herself as an unseen presence after Jiang Yang’s sword practice 46

Power Progression

Bai Tang’s documented changes concern restoration and awakening rather than ordinary realm breakthroughs. While confined to the sword, she states that her cultivation cannot advance 345.

Stage / Realm / Level	Chapter	Notes
Incomplete true spirit	47	Retains her name but has lost nearly all memories; initially accepts that she is a sword spirit.
Sword-essence replenishment	221 222	Absorbs Jiang Yang’s newly attained sword essence. Her translucent manifestation becomes solid, and her decline stops; without fighting, the replenishment can sustain her for several months.
Awakening from prolonged slumber	339	Awakens and immediately detects the aura of a Grotto-Heaven.
Dormant aspect released; Qing He freed	348	Qing He uses Daybreak Separation to release Bai Tang’s dormant aspect into Jiang Yang. Their union grants him Sword Intent, enabling the strike that frees Qing He from the Primordial Three Immortal Platforms.

Background / History

Origins

Bai Tang’s apparent origin was a sword unearthed from a Sword-Washing Pool associated with the Thunderbolt Wind Sky Windwood Lineage. When Jiang Yang first questioned her, the lineage’s name seemed vaguely familiar, but she could recall little beyond her own name 47.

The explanation that she was merely a sword spirit gradually became untenable. She possessed sophisticated knowledge, Cracking Wood divine powers, and exceptional Sword Dao attainments despite having neither a physical cultivation vessel nor a Dharma body. An ancient Cracking Wood inheritance seed stirred memories of slaughter, magical warfare, and the collapse of grotto-heavens and blessed lands 55 69 345.

Her true origin emerges in Azure Corner Heaven. Qing He, a woman identical to Bai Tang, explains that they are the same being. Qing He had stripped away her sword intent and placed it in Bai Du so that someone could carry it outside and eventually bring help. Trapped within the Three Immortal Platforms, she had called for aid forty-nine times over 1,200 years; her attempt eight years earlier involved sending Fang Xu to invite Jiang Yang to the Ancient Cultivator Legacy 346.

Qing He identifies her original self as True Lord Qing Tang, the deceased Golden Core ruler of Azure Corner Heaven who occupied the intercalary position of Execution Thunder. The surviving golden nature represents only a superficial portion of that True Lord, which is why Qing He does not use Qing Tang’s name 347.

Becoming Jiang Yang’s Mentor

Jiang Yang acquires the sword from Fang Xu, then hears Bai Tang laugh when he mistakes a blade’s extended magical light for genuine Sword Qi. She introduces herself and subsequently lets him experience the real attainment before teaching him One Qi Faces the Sun 46 48.

Her early lessons combine precise qi-circulation instructions with exhausting repetition. After Jiang Yang produces a small streak of Sword Qi and collapses, she carries him home and smooths his hair. She later begins combat training with a conjured Vine Sword, matching his power while punishing hesitation, wasted movements, and exposed openings 48 55 56.

Outside the mountain, Bai Tang usually lets Jiang Yang face danger himself. During his duel with Qin Dingyi, she prepares to intervene only when he reaches his limit. After his unexpected breakthrough saves him, she refuses to pursue Qin because acting through his exhausted body could damage his meridians or destabilize his new cultivation 67.

Declining Strength and Replenishment

Bai Tang’s increasing quietness is eventually revealed as deliberate energy conservation. She sleeps more because her activities consume strength, and ordinary vitality-restoring treasures cannot nourish her bodiless true spirit. Jiang Yang’s sword intent would sustain her best; sword essence offers a less effective alternative 162 163.

Concern for her condition becomes a major reason for Jiang Yang to pursue Sword Essence. Once he forms Autumn Response, Bai Tang replenishes herself through a mouth-to-mouth transfer. The process unexpectedly allows him to perceive her sword principles, providing a benefit neither had anticipated 212 220 221 223.

After testing the phenomenon, Bai Tang accepts that her Sword Dao cultivation can help him, but warns that dependence on her intent might obstruct his independent path. Jiang Yang insists that he is using her insight to develop his own understanding rather than simply copying her 224.

Discovering Her Identity

Jiang Yang tries to investigate the place where Bai Tang was found, but Fang Xu’s absence prevents him from obtaining the information. Later, clues connecting the Sword-Washing Pool and its lineage to Azure Corner Heaven give them a more promising lead 209 265.

Bai Tang undergoes a prolonged slumber before awakening amid the conflict at Sandalwood Palace. In Langhuan Pavilion, returning memories prompt her to ask Jiang Yang to visit the Sword-Washing Pool. They find it dried and ruined, but a compelling resonance draws her onward to the Pearl Hall 339 343 345.

There, a tender emerald sprout on the Immortal Platform leaves Bai Tang unresponsive. Qing He appears and explains their shared identity. Their subsequent cooperation with Jiang Yang frees Qing He; Bai Tang then resumes her familiar manner and teaches him about the golden nature they carry 346 348.

Preparing for Reincarnation

After Qing He’s release, the two aspects can manifest as one entity with two bodies. They sometimes disagree, but Bai Tang has agreed that Qing He will lead their outward activities 376.

Bai Tang later supplies Jiang Yang with the ancient method for constructing the Great Net Eight-Vision Platform as he prepares for a journey that will separate them 388.

At the River of Forgetfulness, she tells him to cast Bai Du into the water so that she can use the golden nature to reincarnate. The sword is necessary shelter against the Weak Water’s scouring, protecting her true spirit from falling. Jiang Yang understands the purpose but struggles with losing both her presence and the sword he hoped to retain as a keepsake 391.

Appearance

Bai Tang manifests as a strikingly beautiful woman with a composed, majestic bearing and a gaze sharp enough to make Jiang Yang’s eyes sting. Her form becomes visibly translucent when her strength declines and solidifies after receiving sword essence 54 220 221.

• Hair: Initially described as raven-dark and loosely pinned; a later manifestation has gray-blue hair secured with a plain silver hairpin 54 220.
• Clothing: Appears in a pale blue-green, wide-sleeved robe, and later in a moon-white robe patterned with flowing clouds 54 80.
• Features: Slender brows, a high nose bridge, thin lips, and a white-jade complexion 54 220.
• Expression: Her keen gaze can soften into conspicuous tenderness toward Jiang Yang 348 391.

Personality

Bai Tang is proud, blunt, and exacting about swordsmanship. She treats hesitation as a serious weakness and expects Jiang Yang to attack decisively rather than perform harmless displays. Nevertheless, she limits her power during sparring and acknowledges genuine progress, making her severity purposeful rather than arbitrary 55 56.

Her protectiveness extends beyond combat. She watches over Jiang Yang after exhausting lessons, prioritizes his safety over killing an escaping opponent, edits his letters, and advises him on thoughtful gifts. She discourages excessive reliance on her because she does not want him to become reckless under the assumption that a powerful protector will always save him 48 61 67 70.

She also enjoys teasing him, particularly about romance and his embarrassment. Her confidence becomes less steady during the intimate replenishment process, when she insists that he close his eyes and later struggles with how to face him. His uncomplicated concern quickly softens her irritation 105 191 220 222 276.

Bai Tang’s familiar directness and gentleness contrast with Qing He’s more openly playful manner. Jiang Yang recognizes the distinction emotionally even after learning that they are aspects of the same whole 348 377.

Abilities & Skills

Daybreak Separation Sword Intent

Property	Details
Name	Daybreak Separation 223
Ancient full name	Day-Opening Night-Closing Two Principles Mystery-Sundering Sword 223
Branch	Yin-Yang 223
Manifestation	The White Du Sword carries overwhelming sharpness and killing intent; flowers with golden stamens and white calyxes repeatedly form and fade near its tip 223.

• Represents the culmination of Bai Tang’s lifelong Sword Dao cultivation 224.
• Can be demonstrated safely, but actually wielding it against an enemy strains her weakened true spirit 223.
• Its principles unexpectedly pass to Jiang Yang during sword-essence replenishment; simply observing the sword does not reproduce the same experience 223 224.
• Its use by Qing He releases Bai Tang’s dormant aspect into Jiang Yang, enabling his attainment of Sword Intent 348.

Cracking Wood Divine Powers

• Bai Tang identifies herself with the Cracking Wood Dao after Jiang Yang’s strike carries a trace of her divine powers and severely wounds an alligator beast 69.
• Can cause roots to emerge, grow, twist, and form a Vine Sword almost instantly 56.
• Sustains a living vine through her power; it withers after she withdraws that support 209.
• Acting through Jiang Yang expends his reserves and can endanger his body when he is exhausted 67 69.
• Using a divine power independently carries an especially severe cost while her true spirit remains incomplete 222.

Spiritual Manifestation and Concealment

• Communicates directly within Jiang Yang’s heart and can emerge from the sword or his body in human form 48 54 343.
• Can physically carry Jiang Yang, despite initially existing as a bodiless true spirit 48 162.
• Claims she can conceal herself completely, while warning that conspicuous protection against a Purple Mansion cultivator’s probing could expose Jiang Yang to suspicion 105.
• Cannot pass through Langhuan Pavilion’s spiritual barriers to touch its protected jade slips 343.
• Cannot generate her own magic power without a physical cultivation vessel, preventing her from refining the Spirit Seeds required for Jiang Yang’s pupil art 274.

Energy Replenishment

• Requires sword intent, or less effectively sword essence, supplied by Jiang Yang as the sword’s master 162 163.
• Cannot benefit from Spirit Peaches, which restore bodily vitality rather than sustain her true spirit 162.
• Successful sword-essence replenishment can keep her active for several months if she avoids fighting; combat expenditure remains unpredictable 222.
• Requires Jiang Yang’s willing cooperation: he must actively convert his true essence and spirit sense into sword essence before she can draw it out 221.
• The transfer restores the solidity and warmth of her manifested body 221.

Swordsmanship Instruction

• Understands the third-grade Cave-Origin One-Qi Sword Art after hearing it once and teaches Jiang Yang its circulation route 48.
• Uses matched-power sparring to train commitment, timing, awareness of openings, and tactical adaptation 56.
• Teaches the Scarlet Palace Heart Mansion Meridian-Pulsing Canon, coordinating the middle dantian’s direction of spirit with the lower dantian’s circulation of energy to increase sword speed and force 188.
• Waits until Jiang Yang reaches Foundation Establishment before teaching that method, because insufficient true essence, spirit sense, or meridian resilience could cause serious injury 188.
• Recognizes that sword comprehension is personal and cannot ordinarily be imposed on another cultivator 188.

Cultivation Knowledge and Perception

• Identifies rare inheritances and treasures, including the Cracking Wood inheritance seed, Mist-Rain Mirage Cloud, and Purple Mansion treasures of the Three Yin Way 55 98 137.
• Interprets celestial signs left by a failed Purple Mansion breakthrough and explains their connection to a Gui Water immortal foundation 49.
• Reads fragile lineage records while protecting them with a jade-green glow 121.
• Detects Purple Mansion observers and the aura of a Grotto-Heaven 220 339.
• Senses signs of Jiang Yang’s unusual Destiny through familiarity and experience, but cannot inspect it directly while her fate divine power remains unrecovered 77.

Equipment / Weapons / Items

• White Du Sword / Bai Du — Initially known to Jiang Yang as the Rusty Sword. Houses Bai Tang and carries Daybreak Separation; she clarifies that its apparent rust is not actually rust. Later serves as the shelter required for her planned passage through the River of Forgetfulness 220 221 223 391.
• Vine Sword — Conjured from growing roots and used for training. Its unpowered blows punish Jiang Yang’s defensive openings 56.
• Plain silver hairpin — Secures her hair in later manifestations 220 391.
• Golden-nature sprout — A surviving fragment associated with True Lord Qing Tang, named Upper Thunder Transforms into Destruction Thunder, Shifting Stations Nature 348.
• Great Net Eight-Vision Platform text — An ancient construction method she gives Jiang Yang; the platform harmonizes different Daos and nurtures spiritual vitality 388.

Relationships

• Jiang Yang — Sword master, student, and close companion. Their bond develops from wary curiosity into mutual dependence: she guides and protects him, while he investigates her origins and cultivates sword essence to sustain her 48 67 163 209 346.
• Qing He — Another aspect of the same being, not merely a look-alike. They can manifest in two bodies and retain contrasting manners; their disagreements continue after Qing He’s release 346 348 376 377.
• True Lord Qing Tang — Their deceased original self. Bai Tang and Qing He derive from only part of her surviving golden nature, rather than representing the complete True Lord 347.
• Fang Xu — Sold the sword containing Bai Tang to Jiang Yang. Qing He also used him in an earlier attempt to bring Jiang Yang to the Ancient Cultivator Legacy 46 209 346.
• Shang Qingzheng — Bai Tang encourages Jiang Yang’s relationship with her, helps with letters and gifts, and admits creating the gust that pushed him into their earlier kiss 53 70 191.

Notable Quotes

“Besides... you still have me.” 53

“A Sword Cultivator’s sword must be sharp. You must be ruthless, decisive, and dare to kill!” 56

“Gathering your spirit and focusing your intent is tension; emptying your mind is release. Only by balancing the two can you nurture yourself.” 57

“You need only cast the sword into the River of Forgetfulness, and I can use the golden nature to reincarnate.” 391